Easy ideas for bringing people together

Showing our kid's teachers how much we appreciate them is critical given the importance of the job they do. Teacher appreciation can be part of an organized day, a school wide organized effort, or just one parent sitting down to write a thank you card for helping a child develop the joy of learning.

At VolunteerSpot,
we LOVE teachers! We also love that our volunteers do, too. That's why we've created a free ebook packed full of ideas to help parents with the greatest ideas to show teachers how much we love them. There are creative and unique ideas for celebrating teachers all year
long - many of them no-cost or low cost -- all of them high-impact!
We've rolled them together into helpful eBook filled with Teacher Gift Ideas you will love.

Whether
you are making plans individually, with your fellow class parents, or
as a PTA/PTO, we hope this eBook will spark some ideas for saying thank
you to your teachers this coming Teacher Appreciation Week and beyond.

Back to School ThanksgivingWinter Holidays Valentine’s Day Teacher Appreciation WeekEnd of the Year

Hands on kid-to-teacher gift suggestions that will teach kids how to have and show their appreciation

A teacher-approved list of the best (and worst) gifts

Gifts for long-time and retiring teachers

Gifts for Middle School and High School Teachers

Giving the gift of time with VolunteerSpot

One of the greatest ideas I know is to organize parents to deliver a
home cooked family size meal to each teacher during Teacher
Appreciation Week. As us working parents know, there's nothing more
welcome at the end of a hard day than a healthy, home-cooked meal that's already made! There are a million great ideas (except coffee mugs ;-) -- so start planning your teacher's week today!! Our ebook makes it so simple!!

Before I owned a home or had kids, the only DIY I ever did was take a shower. I was not handy, and I hadn't spent a lot of time around kids. Well, flash forward more years than I care to admit and I've completed many a simple home DIY project, like painting countless rooms, and with the kids, started babysitting coops, helped at preschool and elementary schools, helped with gardening, you name it.

The idea started when a few of us who met at camp 2 years ago realized we had a couple problems scheduling camp this summer. For a couple of us, we just couldn't seem to find anything our kids were getting excited about. More dramatically, 3 of the main breadwinners in our extended community of campers had lost their jobs and camp was just out of the question. We still wanted to get the kids together, and to solve both problems, decided to set up and run our own camp!!

The planning and preparation is relatively easy -- just make sure you tackle all the concerns each parent may have, and set up rules. Also, consult the new ebook VolunteerSpot has created: Do-It-Yourself Neighborhood Camp. Please view it below, and read on for more information about setting up your own DIY Camp. To see the eBook full-screen, click on the icon in the lower
right corner that looks like a little projector screen (it's just to the right of the page numbers). When you're
done, pres ESC to come back to this post.

One
of the keys to a successful DIY Neighborhood Summer Camp is clearly
laying out the responsibilities of all parents, very similar to what
you might do with a babysitting coop. Some important points:

Agree
on safety rules all will abide by (for example: one-third of American
families own guns; there needs to be a safety rule that if guns are in
the home, all weapons are locked and secured). How many days will each
parent work? For elementary age kids 1 adult per five kids is probably
a good rule of thumb, plus it works out to 1 day worked equals four
days off! Parents with 2 kids work one shift for each of them. Younger
kids need a higher ratio.

What is the age range of kids? Toddlers are harder to watch than 12 year olds, think this through and get agreement.

Are
there pools at any of the camp homes? Will the camp pay for a
lifeguard? Is there a fence? What about sunscreen and sun safety?

Will
the host camp home provide snacks or will parents send them. If the
camp provides snacks are there guidelines about what's appropriate or
is a junk food free-for-all completely fine since it's summer?

Is
video entertainment allowed? Under what circumstances? For me
personally, I don't want my kid supposedly going to camp and then
watching SpongeBob all morning (or something less savory).

Discipline:
What are the discipline guidelines, conflict resolution plans, and
ultimate penalties available? This is a critical point for every to
agree to.

Agreeing to ground rules ahead of time is important
because it will prevent conflict later. It also prevents any one parent
from feeling overly scrutinized -- these rules apply to everyone, and
once they are in place, every one can feel comfortable knowing that
supervision and programming will meet their expectations. Then comes
the fun part -- planning the activities and setting the schedule.

If
camp is batched in 2 week increments, it can rotate through all 10
houses so each family gets an equal dose of chaos. If some families
just can't host, there has to be a trade-off to make up to whoever
hosts twice. (e.g. A working parent may pay a stay-at-home parent in
exchange for hosting an extra day.) And finally, set up the activity
plan and so everyone knows what happening and figure out the supplies
needed to run the activities. A budget should be set up for supplies
(agreed on by the members -- there's nothing worse than one person
thinking that a hundred dollars is a reasonable budget when most feel
like $10 is more than enough. We're in a recession here folks, be
sensitive!!)

Before camp begins, have an orientation meeting with
all campers and parents present. This gives everyone a chance for
introductions and reassures the kids that all the parents know the
other parents and kids. You can let them know all the fun they'll be
having, and a little bit about the discipline plan and camp rules.
(Kids knowing that there are agreed on rules and consequences while all
the parents are standing there can prevent a lot of "rule testing"
misbehavior during camp itself).

Finally, the genius part is you can easily set up the entire calendar of workdays, locations, supplies in VolunteerSpot, providing easy reminders to each worker and a good place for all participants to keep track of everything that's happening.

So
get ready to get out there and have some real fun this summer -- for
you and your kids - start your own camp and let everyone - adults and
kids -- make some great new memories this summer.

One effect of tough economic times and tighter budgets is many of us are facing a long summer of child-minding and childcare juggling. Extended quality time with the kids sounds great in theory, until the 5th trip to the grocery store with all 3 kids in tow, and no chance this week ever for a quiet walk, and schools been out less than 3 weeks. Is there an aisle in Target where we can gather all the screamers together?

We'd all love a quality camp experience for our kids and not just because we'd like a break or need child care. For our kids, staying social in summer creates special bonds that supersede the day-to-day stress of school life. Every year my daughter has had to the chance to go to a local summer camp, she always makes one important new friend, there's just something about summer camp that opens up those possibilities.

So how do you create a quality camp experience for your kids without breaking the bank? Some planning, some cooperation and some kids can equal a fantastic neighborhood camp experience. To make it easy to get started, VolunteerSpot has created a brand new eBook: Do-It-Yourself Neighborhood Camp. Please view it below, and read on for more information about setting up your own DIY Camp. To see the eBook full-screen, click on the icon in the lower
right corner that looks like a little projector screen (it's just to the right of the page numbers). When you're
done, pres ESC to come back to this post.

One of the keys to a successful DIY Neighborhood Summer Camp is clearly laying out the responsibilities of all parents, very similar to what you might do with a babysitting coop. Some important points:

Agree on safety rules all will abide by (for example: one-third of American families own guns; there needs to be a safety rule that if guns are in the home, all weapons are locked and secured). How many days will each parent work? For elementary age kids 1 adult per five kids is probably a good rule of thumb, plus it works out to 1 day worked equals four days off! Parents with 2 kids work one shift for each of them. Younger kids need a higher ratio.

What is the age range of kids? Toddlers are harder to watch than 12 year olds, think this through and get agreement.

Are there pools at any of the camp homes? Will the camp pay for a lifeguard? Is there a fence? What about sunscreen and sun safety?

Will the host camp home provide snacks or will parents send them. If the camp provides snacks are there guidelines about what's appropriate or is a junk food free-for-all completely fine since it's summer?

Is video entertainment allowed? Under what circumstances? For me personally, I don't want my kid supposedly going to camp and then watching SpongeBob all morning (or something less savory).

Discipline: What are the discipline guidelines, conflict resolution plans, and ultimate penalties available? This is a critical point for every to agree to.

Agreeing to ground rules ahead of time is important because it will prevent conflict later. It also prevents any one parent from feeling overly scrutinized -- these rules apply to everyone, and once they are in place, every one can feel comfortable knowing that supervision and programming will meet their expectations. Then comes the fun part -- planning the activities and setting the schedule.

If camp is batched in 2 week increments, it can rotate through all 10 houses so each family gets an equal dose of chaos. If some families just can't host, there has to be a trade-off to make up to whoever hosts twice. (e.g. A working parent may pay a stay-at-home parent in exchange for hosting an extra day.) And finally, set up the activity plan and so everyone knows what happening and figure out the supplies needed to run the activities. A budget should be set up for supplies (agreed on by the members -- there's nothing worse than one person thinking that a hundred dollars is a reasonable budget when most feel like $10 is more than enough. We're in a recession here folks, be sensitive!!)

Before camp begins, have an orientation meeting with all campers and parents present. This gives everyone a chance for introductions and reassures the kids that all the parents know the other parents and kids. You can let them know all the fun they'll be having, and a little bit about the discipline plan and camp rules. (Kids knowing that there are agreed on rules and consequences while all the parents are standing there can prevent a lot of "rule testing" misbehavior during camp itself).

Finally, the genius part is you can easily set up the entire calendar of workdays, locations, supplies in VolunteerSpot, providing easy reminders to each worker and a good place for all participants to keep track of everything that's happening.

So get ready to get out there and have some real fun this summer -- for you and your kids - start your own camp and let everyone - adults and kids -- make some great new memories this summer.

It’s National Volunteer
Week in the US and Canada (other countries celebrate at different
times).Bravo to all of you who work so
hard all year on behalf of your communities!

We all know that it’s
important to recognize volunteers, but recognition is much more than saying
thank you annually.It has little to do
with lunches, gifts, or certificates.It’s
an ongoing process that we need to practice in every interaction we have with
our team members.As this special week
gives us an opportunity to celebrate volunteers collectively, here are some ideas
to consider year-round:

"
“Recognition”
contains the root word “cognition” –
really seeing and understanding something.One way to see something is to shine a light on it.That’s a good way to think about public
recognition:you’re raising the
visibility of what volunteers have done.So be sure you focus on outcomes
and impact, not merely on activities
or hours served.How did the volunteer
service matter and to whom.

There is a
world of difference between general, group recognition and a personalized thank you to an individual
volunteer.In fact, when the applause is
directed at everyone together, some people are included who may have done
nothing at all!Equal praise expressed
to all raises the suspicion that perhaps no one really knows who did what.By all means thank “all supporters” or “everyone
who participated.”But then go further
and make each volunteer feel noticed as well as thanked.

Thank people as soon as possible after they did
something and, whenever possible, as individuals.A blast e-mail with generic “you’re all great”
platitudes is not as effective as a message that starts with the volunteer’s
name and mentions specific things
that person really did.A quick
telephone call or a handwritten note that’s postal mailed (remember that?)
raises the sincerity of the appreciation, too.

Notice,
remember, and comment on extra effort.So, although you may be thanking someone for
chairing a committee, think how much greater the effect if you can also add,
“and those muffins you baked for the emergency breakfast meeting were
scrumptious!”Or, “you were such a fine
math tutor this year and you went above-and-beyond when you took your student
to the mall to show math in action.”

It may not be
obvious, but good instructions as a
volunteer begins a task also show that you care.Take the time to do a mental “walking through”
of what someone is likely to experience at a special event or on his or her
first day of volunteering.Anticipate
both the obvious and a few unexpected questions and provide the answers,
proving that you want to make the volunteer feel supported and be
successful.For example:the best place to park your car or leave
personal belongings where they will be safe; whethercoffee will be available and its cost (or if
it’s free); what to do with the checklists when they’re completed; a list of
key people who can answer different sorts of on-the-spot questions – and where
or how to contact them.

Welcome newcomers, especially on their second
day of service.First, remember that
they are scheduled to be there (VolunteerSpot will help with that!) and greet
them with a smile.Introduce them around
and make sure they can get busy quickly.Before they go home, ask them how their shift went and say thank
you.Now most leaders do this naturally
on a newcomer’s first day.And then the
attention stops!It’s the second day on
which the new volunteer feels comfortable enough to ask more questions or
focuses on remembering the names of team members.Make sure someone is still there to be
helpful.

Another very important form of recognition to all
volunteers who are doing wonderful work is to deal with those volunteers who are not doing a good job.If you permit a few people to break the
rules, act undependably, be unpleasant – whatever the negative behavior is –
without consequence, you send the message that doing things right doesn’t
really matter.Or that those trying
their hardest are a bit foolish, since top performance is not necessarily
expected.Furthermore, by not taking
steps to improve the work or behavior of problem volunteers, you are also being
unfair to them. What shows greater
respect:acting as if the person has the
ability to do better or assuming their poor performance is the best they can
do?So it’s recognition to hold high
standards.

Develop ways
for volunteers to give their input
into the design of the work they do.Not
everyone wants to be a planner, but everyone benefits when those who have good
ideas can contribute them.Make it clear
how decisions are reached and when in the process it’s possible for someone to
participate.Don’t make newcomer feel
they have to work their way up from 17th Vice President before their
opinions will carry any weight!

A corollary of welcoming input is seeking feedback – and then doing something
about what you learn.If you have no
intention of changing your procedures if volunteers report problems, then don’t
ask anyone to evaluate or comment in the first place.Ask intentional questions that will draw out
suggestions, not just feelings.“The
entertainment was: __great __ok __awful” does not tell you anywhere near as
much as “What did you think was the best part of the entertainment and
why?”Note that it is recognition to ask
volunteers’ opinions (again, only if someone pays attention to what they tell
you).

The most
powerful way to show appreciation is to act
on a volunteer’s idea and give her or him credit for it.But not every suggestion can be put into
action, nor do people expect that.But
you can make it clear that the idea was seriously considered and give an
explanation for why the decision was no.The recognition comes from feeling appreciated for trying to strengthen
the entire effort.

About Susan J. Ellis: Susan is president
of Energize, Inc., an international training, consulting and publishing firm
specializing in volunteerism.Based in
Philadelphia (USA), the 32-year- old firm has helped a wide diversity of
clients across North America, Europe, Latin
America, Asia, Israel,
and Australasia to start or expand volunteer efforts.Ellis has written 12 books on volunteerism and over 90 articles.For 18 years she has written the “On
Volunteers” column for the national publication, The NonProfit Times.She is
co-publisher of the international online journal, e-Volunteerism (www.e-volunteerism.com), and dean of faculty
for the online volunteer management training program, EveryoneReady®.Browse the 1400+ pages of free volunteer
management information on the Energize Web site:http://www.energizeinc.com

What I do is help
to support those others in our department who coordinate volunteers for
their programs as well as coordinate volunteers to work at our city’s
community events. These events occur about 4-5 times a year and include Lynnwood Lights (seasonal
holiday event), Spring Events (these are the ones currently listed with
Volunteer Spot), 4th of July, etc.

This year is the
city’s 50th Birthday Celebration and we are planning many additional
fun events, thus have a potential for even more need of event
volunteers.

How did you get started as a volunteer leader?

I have always
been a volunteer – my parents encouraged me to volunteer at a very
early age and I have never stopped. I have worked managing volunteers
in my various jobs (including 3 years as a volunteer coordinator) for
over 15 years including non-profit and now the public sector. I love
volunteering and volunteers! Volunteering is a most rewarding way to
give something back to your community and meet all kinds of people! -
Also the same reasons I love managing volunteers – seeing individuals
proud to serve and connect with their community, as well as getting to
know so many wonderful people I may not have otherwise met.

What’s one piece of advice you have for volunteers or their leaders out there?

Advice for
volunteer leaders: Remember that the volunteers are unpaid staff.
Respect them and their time like you would anyone working for your
organization.

Why did you decide to use VolunteerSpot?

I had been
looking for something like this service for a while to streamline our
volunteer recruiting efforts and take them online – where most of our
volunteers are already. I only knew about one other free service like
it and I was not happy with that one because it didn’t allow me to
customize the information, it also did not have the privacy settings
that I needed - all the volunteers could see anyone who had signed up,
plus our city’s spam filters were keeping emails from this website from
getting through to me. Overall, VolunteerSpot seems like a great
resource for our organization – it’s easy to use and I can manage all
the sign-ups in one location rather than dealing with individual
sign-up sheets that groups print out and then send back to me with
handwriting that I cannot read! I also love that it sends out reminders
to the volunteers.

We salute Kristin Price and all the volunteer heroes out there everyday making our communities better places to live! If you're using VolunteerSpot, write and tell us about what you're doing, and give us a chance to shine our Volunteer Spotlight on you!! Just email us at VS@volunteerspot.com.

Part of the fun of VolunteerSpot is that it's a business we're building with the primary goal of making the world a better place by making volunteering easier. We figure if all those awesome volunteer organizers could spend more of their time helping people (instead of trading emails and phone calls with volunteers) they would be happier and stick around longer -- and help even more people, communities, schools, etc. We project that we'll be able to bring volunteer organizations the equivalent of $8+ million in annual productivity savings by 2011, and we're pretty excited about that.

For the people who want to make a difference in their communities, the volunteers, we've built VolunteerSpot to make it easy to say YES, stay on track and enjoy the experience. At VolunteerSpot-powered activities, more people are showing up and coming back because our tool makes it a little bit (or a lot) easier. (Nationally, 1/3 of all volunteers drop out annually -- most frequently attributed to poor coordination.) And of course, we'll need to make money, or else we can't provide these great tools, and we have a plan to get there.

Making a profit AND helping others defines what's known in business circles as a Social Venture; the doing good part of a company's results is called the Double Bottom Line. VolunteerSpot is thrilled to be among 21 Social Ventures that have been invited to present our business to the Investors' Circle Spring San Francisco Conference.

We will be presenting on April 20th, 2009 along with twenty other mission-driven
companies focused on solving environmental and social problems facing our
world. Investors’ Circle brings together a great community of investors,
entrepreneurs and other professionals looking to accelerate the development of
a sustainable economy.

We think the other companies presenting are doing some pretty cool things to help in the world, too, and we wanted to highlight some of them here:

Peacekeeper Causemetics - This cosmetics company donates ALL its after tax profits from sales of its organic lipsticks, gloss, nail polish and polish remover to organizations helping women around the world. The mineral-based products have not been tested on animals, and care has been taken to avoid use of any chemicals deemed as dangerous.

TerraFusion has created an enzyme-based additive to use in road bed construction that's friendlier to the earth, speeds construction time, saves money and makes paved and unpaved roads last longer. Can we have some of that, now?!

AlterEco works with farmers in developing countries to produce high quality, varietal rice, quinoa, chocolate, coffee, tea, olive oil and sugar using sustainable farming methods and fair trade pricing so the farmers get a greater share of the profits from the food they produce. As a fan of the native grain quinoa, I was excited to see these guys sell black quinoa (which I've never seen before) and I hope I can buy from them next week! Save me a box!

It's gratifying in a world full of conflicts and concern that there is hope and progress in business. We can't wait to meet all our fellow presenters and continue working to boost both sets of bottom lines.

National Teacher Appreciation Week is now less than a month away and it's time to make plans to celebrate all the wonderful men and women who hold such an important place in our kids lives. There's still time to set up your plans and be ready for the week running May 4th - 8th, 2009 (always the first full week in May).

At VolunteerSpot, we LOVE teachers and National Teacher Appreciation Week is an important celebration! We also love that our volunteers love teachers, too. Teachers and parents, thank you for sharing your ideas for the Greatest Teacher Gifts back in January, when we called for suggestions. You had creative and unique ideas for celebrating teachers all year long - many of them no-cost or low cost -- all of them high-impact! We've rolled them together into helpful eBook filled with Teacher Gift Ideas you will love. CLICK HERE to view The Greatest Gifts For Teachers

Morning Surprise - every morning a different parent brings the teacher his favorite kind of coffee and breakfast treat (here in Texas it's often a breakfast taco!)

Community Bouquet - on a designated day, each child brings one item to add to a class bouquet - just one stem (flowers or foliage, whatever the child wants and the family budget allows)

Home Cooked Dinners - One family per day arranges to provide a home cooked meal to the teacher to take home. Even something as simple as a pasta casserole and a green salad makes the teacher's day of appreciation carry over to her home

Teacher Lounge O Plenty - families and local business will donate an array of baked goods and fruit to keep the teachers lounge totally packed with goodies all through the week.

No matter what you plan to to, it's easy to get all parents helping if you set up your Teacher Appreciation Week plan in the VolunteerSpot planning wizard. Create spots for each job (only takes about 5 minutes), plug in the parent email addresses, send it out and all the jobs are claimed and easy to track. VolunteerSpot will even send out the reminders automatically so parents can plan ahead. We have tons more helpful ideas is our ebook. Check it out and make this Teacher Appreciation Week the best ever!!

VolunteerSpot loves to highlight the good works of our users around the country. Our spotlight today shines on Father James Thibodeaux of St. Peter's Episcopal Parish in Seattle, Washington.

Please
tell us about the volunteer needs at your church.

St. Peter’s
Episcopal Parish, like many volunteer organizations, has seemingly infinite
possibilities for volunteers and their ideas. Block parties, neighborhood litter
and graffiti cleanup, family nights, BBQ’s, Sukiyaki take-outs, family
camp and worship are just a few activities in our lineup. New ideas spring up
all the time, but organization and volunteer buy-in are key to actually making
things happen around here. VolunteerSpot has been helping us with our
organization and through its services, volunteers have one more simple way to be
a part of what’s happening at St. Peter’s, Seattle.

How did
you get started as a volunteer leader?

In church
lingo we talk about a “call” to ministry. The experience looks
different for every person, but it always boils down to an irrefutable, irresistible
sense that God wants something of you. People often put it off, but it never
seems to go away! For me, I felt God calling me to the professional ministry
when I was 5. It took 25 years for me to become a priest (not many ordain 5
year olds!), but during that whole time of education and training the “call”
never changed or disappeared.

What’s one piece of advice you have for ministry volunteers or their
leaders out there?

St. Francis
of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel at all times. When necessary, use
words.” What we do and who we are speaks more about our mission than
anything we say or put in print. My prayer for the volunteers of St. Peter’s
and for every volunteer is that we all live out our various calls to serve in
our actions first, then through our words. And because it takes people to live
out a mission, remember to treat your fellow volunteers with kindness and love.
As St. Paul says (paraphrased), “compete against one another in showing
honor to each other.”

Why did
you decide to use VolunteerSpot?

We needed
something simple, easy, inexpensive, and easily acquired by our volunteers.
VolunteerSpot required no downloads, charged no fees, and provided a clear and
easy interface for both coordinators and volunteers.

Anything
else you’d like our readers to know about your organization or
volunteering?

Whether you’re
a long time Seattle resident, recently moved to the area, or are just passing through,
you are welcome to be a part of St. Peter’s activities. Please see our
website www.stpeterseattle.org or
call (206) 323-5250 for opportunities to grow, encounter God, and make a
difference in our world!

Hurray - you did it! Invitations have been sent and volunteers have signed up...now what? Come back anytime and click MY ACTIVITIES to check on your signup, invite more people, and make changes.

Here's a quick tour:

Calendar Tab - shows at-a-glance how many people have signed up and how many people or items are still needed. From this tab you can make changes to your plan, copy days, print reports, and give volunteers specific assignments. You will see people icons (for things to do), basket icons (for things to bring), and pencil icons (indicating room available to signup). Green people and baskets mean FULL.

Gold person, basket and pencil icons indicate that there is still room for
people to sign up on this day. 4 / 10 next to the person icon means that 4 of 10 total volunteer assignment
spots have been filled. The basket icon followed by 0 / 2 indicates that no one has signed up yet for the two to-bring items.

Gold person and pencil icons indicate that there is still room for people to sign up on this day. The single number in the middle of the clipboard shows that there is No Limit on the number of people who can signup on this day. 4 people have already signed up.

Green person icon indicates that the signup is full. 10 / 10 indicates that 10 of 10 total volunteer spots have been filled.

5: Volunteers - check to see who has responded to your invitation, who has signed up, and who has still not viewed it. Add volunteer names and phone numbers and check an individual's assignments. Near the bottom of this tab, there is an option check-box for the organizer to allow volunteers to see others signed-up for the activity.

Many thanks to our fabulous beta program participants who have been using VolunteerSpot with their PTA groups, Scout and youth groups, mentoring and literacy programs, pet rescue, races, tournaments and more!!

We've learned a lot from you in a few short months and are pleased to announce the following enhancements to our simple, free, online volunteer scheduler:

Capture of volunteer names and phone # upon sign up. No need for you to spend time entering contact info.-- each person enters their own, when they sign up!

Invite volunteers through a URL link you paste in your own message or on a website. No more re-entry of email addresses. Use this option to invite people using your own email group, or through a listserve like Yahoo!Groups. Choose this option in the Planning Wizard or click the option in the left column of your Activity Status tab. Learn more.Put a 'Sign Up Now' button for your activity on your website. We'll give you HTML code to drop a button on your website allowing volunteers to sign up. Please note, we don't screen volunteers for you, that's your responsibility! Learn More

Volunteer entrance on home page. If a volunteer looses the email invitation that has your activity's sign up link, they may request new link(s) directly from the Volunteer Entrance.

View your month's signups at a glance. Calendar Status View replaces the Activity Status Tab. Quickly see which days are full (green icons) and which still have open spots (pencil and gold icons).Click a clipboard to view status and see who has signed up.

Print a roster & day's sign up sheet. Grab a list of your volunteers to take with you to your activity. Print using the File tab in your browser.

Download your signup to Excel. Keep a copy of your volunteer lists and signup items for your own records.

Allow volunteers to view who else has signed up. Now volunteers can signup with their friends! Activate this option in the Planning Wizard for new activities, and in the green Volunteer tab for existing activities. As volunteers sign up, they can see who else is working their shift by clicking the underlined number of people signed up.

Planning calendar enhancements. Click to Plan and Copy days -- no more drag and drop in the calendar planning view. The copy pad now highlights 'today' and alerts you if you copy over a previously planned day.

See a volunteer's entire schedule. Clicking a volunteer's name in the green Volunteer tab shows all their assignments for a specific activity. Add contact info. here and make any changes by clicking a day.Alerts of last-minute cancellations. We'll send you an email alert if anyone cancels their commitments after receiving their reminder email. (Reminder emails are sent two days prior to an assignment). At this time, we don't send you an alert if anyone cancels prior to that - so do keep an eye out on your signup.Examples in the Planning Wizard. Several activity examples are provided to help you configure your signup and organize what you want volunteers To Do and To Bring.Capturing volunteers without email addresses.You may now make assignments for volunteers without email addresses by recording their names and phone numbers in the assignment screen. Reminders will alert you two days before their shift so you may call them directly.

We hope you find these new features helpful. Please keep us posted about what you like and what you would like to see improved - we're listening!! With your help, we can be the BEST free, volunteer scheduling software on the web!

Teacher Appreciation Week 2009 will happen May 4th - 8th this year. That's all the time you need to get your fellow parents organized for some meaningful activities to really make your kid's teacher feel appreciated.

Teacher Appreciation Week always takes place the first full week in May, probably because by this point, teachers REALLY need a boost! Kids are crazy with spring fever and dreams of summer, and it's this silly season that tests our teachers more than any other.

At VolunteerSpot,
we LOVE teachers and Teacher Appreciation Week is an important
celebration! The key is to have fun celebrations planned for each day, and make sure to coordinate with other parents -- everyone will want to take part, so having enough activities for everyone is important. You can use the simple VolunteerSpot Planning Wizard to set up the schedule of all activities , things to bring and then send an email out to the class parents list and each person can quickly click to claim their slot on the Teacher Appreciation Week Schedule.

Morning
Surprise - every morning a different parent brings the teacher his
favorite kind of coffee and breakfast treat (here in Texas it's often a
breakfast taco!)

Community
Bouquet - on a designated day, each child brings one item to add to a
class bouquet - just one stem (flowers or foliage, whatever the child
wants and the family budget allows)

Home
Cooked Dinners - One family per day arranges to provide a home cooked
meal to the teacher to take home. Even something as simple as a pasta
casserole and a green salad makes the teacher's day of appreciation
carry over to her home

Teacher
Lounge O Plenty - families and local business will donate an array of
baked goods and fruit to keep the teachers lounge totally packed with
goodies all through the week.

No matter what you plan to to, it's easy to get all parents helping if you set up your Teacher Appreciation Week plan in the VolunteerSpot planning wizard.
Create spots for each job (only takes about 5 minutes), plug in the
parent email addresses, send it out and all the jobs are claimed and
easy to track. VolunteerSpot will even send out the reminders
automatically so parents can plan ahead.

For more terrific ideas, have a look at our free ebook, the Greatest Gifts for Teachers. Check it out and make this Teacher Appreciation
Week the best ever!!

We've all been involved in some group where the refrain eventually comes around to "have you noticed it's always the same 7 people doing everything (I'm tired!) and how do we get more people volunteering?" It's inevitable, and we probably use the same strategies to call out to more people to join in -- newsletters, mass email, ask for more volunteers at a group meeting, etc. But what if it's not that people aren't interested in helping, it's that our expectations are slightly off?

Our guest blogger today is Susan Ellis, President of Energize, Inc., a training, consulting, and
publishing firm that specializes in volunteerism. She offers a fresh take on the issue of expanding volunteering through reframing our own notion of who our volunteers are. Read on and see how to expand your own volunteer corps!

----

Volunteer organizers become much
more savvy in developing meaningful and appealing work for a wide range of
volunteers way past the old model of regularly-scheduled helper. We've learned
to run single days of service and deal with spontaneous volunteers. We
can assign projects to corporate employee teams, intergenerational families,
and those who want to volunteer virtually. Yet we are still missing some
opportunities.

What kind of volunteer work might you design for the following less traditional
prospects (and this is only a partial list)?

Seniors over the age of 90 (the
fastest growing age category today)

Children under the age of 14

Newly-unemployed people wanting
a bridge between their old job and finding a new one

Voluntourists (people spending
vacation or conference time in your area - from one day to a season - and
who want to be of use to the community)

Current clients who want to get
involved to help others

The CEOs of the major companies
in your area

University professors (not just
their students!)

Blue collar
tradespeople

I'm not suggesting that every organization needs
the sort of help these people might offer. But how did you react -- in
your gut -- to each group on this list? If you can get past some preconceived
notions about who is a potential volunteer, you can vastly expand the pool of
community resources available to you.

Sometimes we simply avoid potential resources because we can't picture how we
would work with them. Maybe that's why so many senior volunteering
programs are focusing on people in their 50s (who don't identify at all with
the concept of "senior") and not on healthy nonagenarians. It's
just easier -- and there are fewer transportation and health concerns.
It's the same with engaging young children in service. Yet both ends of the age
spectrum offer unique perspectives and skill bases.

Sometimes we can't imagine that a group might even be interested in
volunteering with us. We approach students, but not their teachers or
professors -- and who is more skilled? We recruit secretaries and
salespeople, but not their managers and certainly not their CEOs. And why
not? Do we offer any volunteer work executives would find
appealing? What do we think that is?

In a similar vein, it's fascinating how rarely we reach out to labor unions,
trade councils, or blue collar businesses. We won't think twice about asking a
white collar professional to volunteer as a consultant or donate training
services, but do we invite plumbers or roofers to give their labor (also
professionally skilled) pro bono? Why not?

Bet you're wondering how you'll ever be able to coordinate and support these
populations, who will need extra time and attention. Don't forget the strategy
of recruiting interested volunteers knowledgeable about each group to run a
pilot project with the target population, or to be team or shift leaders for
the group.

If you find yourself with a very homogeneous volunteer corps, it may be because
you are gravitating towards the "usual suspects" in your recruitment.
Whether you intended to or not, the volunteer assignments you offer appeal to a
narrow slice of the community. Try welcoming people who fall outside the norm
you've established of age, status, schedule, and other factors. They may be
delighted at the invitation to get involved and you'll expand the value of the
volunteer effort for your organization.

----

Susan Ellis founded
Energize, Inc. an international training, consulting and publishing
firm specializing in volunteerism. If these words are in your vocabulary--community
service, membership development, auxiliary, community organizing,
service-learning, lay ministry, pro bono work, supporter, friends
group, political activist, service club-- Energize can help!! Founded
in 1977, Energize has assisted organizations of all types with their
volunteer efforts--whether they are health and human service organizations,
cultural arts groups, professional associations, or schools.

Little League baseball
parents are enjoying one of the true joys of raising our kids - watching them learn new skills, make new friends, and every now and then do something truly amazing.

Parents
of Little League baseball players don't just watch the games, they are
the baseball coach, they assist and they volunteer for snack and
concession stand duty, plus a number of other key posts that make the
season run smoothly.

Sometimes filling all those Little League baseball
volunteer roles and reminding parents of their jobs can be a real
hassle, but VolunteerSpot gives
parents the opportunity to focus on the fun stuff
(playing baseball) by eliminating the busy work of coordinating parent
volunteers. This free online tool is as simple as point and click
online shopping, but makes it super easy to setup the entire season
schedule of jobs, email parents to sign up and suddenly it's done! It
even works as an add on to team coordination web sites like ETeamz.

Please join the other parent coaches and volunteers
out there who are using VolunteerSpot to simplify their Little League
volunteer coordination needs. In a handful of minutes, the coach or
volunteer coordinator sets up a schedule of needs using our simple
online calendar planning wizard. Parents are invited using an email
message, URL link or a button on your team or league website. In just
a few clicks, parents choose when and how to help, and the schedule is
updated in real time as volunteer spots fill up. VolunteerSpot sends
automated reminder and thank you messages helping everyone keep their
commitments. Great for:

Volunteer Umpire Scheduling

Snack Shack/Concessions Stand (scheduling who works it and what supplies are needed)

Car pools

Parent Coach Assistants

Snack Schedule

Batting/Pitching Practice Intensives

Tournaments

and more...

Start Scheduling Little League Volunteers Now with VolunteerSpot's free and easy sign up software! At VolunteerSpot,
we're ready to help you get rid of paper volunteer sign up sheets,
reduce you workload, increase parent participation and help make your
season a success!